1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and method for privacy screening.
2. Background of the Invention
Many telephone customers do not wish to be disturbed by unwanted telephone calls. Most customers especially dislike being disturbed at certain times of the day, such as dinner time or after midnight. In an effort to prevent disturbing telephone calls, many customers turn their home telephone off—some by unplugging it, some by turning it off, and some by turning its ringer off. Others forward their calls to voicemail. In some cases, customers use CLASS Call Forwarding Variable Service.
Turning off their telephone or forwarding their calls can cause them to miss calls that they may want to take. If they forget to turn their telephone back on or stop forwarding their calls, they will miss every call. And, unless they have voicemail, even if they remember to turn their telephone back on, they will miss calls that came in while their telephone was off, some of which they would want to receive.
Also, even if they forwarded their calls to voicemail, they will not know who called until they call their voicemail to check, which may delay them from talking with someone they want to talk to right away. Further, only callers who left a voicemail message will be logged in the caller's voicemail box.
In addition, people's practice of turning off their home telephone is costly to the telephone services providers, such as Bell South. It is costly because the telephone service providers have to spend their resources to connect telephone calls to a person's telephone even when their telephone is off. Because the person does not hear the telephone, the telephone may ring for as long as the calling party wants to wait, further draining the service provider's resources because the service provider keeps the call connected until the calling party hangs up.
In an effort to prevent disruptive telephone calls, many customers subscribe to services provided by service providers that restrict calls from being connected to the subscriber. Some of these services prevent all calls from being connected to the subscriber, such as call-forwarding. One of the problems with these services is that they prevent calls from being connected that the subscriber may want to take.
Other services prevent all calls from being connected unless the subscriber takes the effort, after the call has been made, to agree accept the call. In order to receive calls, the subscriber may be required to answer a call from the service provider, listen to a message from the calling party to determine who is calling, and tell the service provider that the call can be connected. Not only can this be irritating, it may also inform the calling party that the subscriber is home and does not wish to speak to the calling party. It can also be embarrassing when the called party knows the calling party but refuses to take to call. Generally, this arrangement wastes time because it requires excessive participation of the subscriber.
Further, even without subscribing to such a service, many telephone customers miss important calls and are not connected to calling parties that they wish to be connected to for various reasons. One such example is when the customer is already on the line. Typically in such a case, the feature the service provider provides is to play a busy signal to the calling party and to not connect the calling party. Another typical feature, sometimes called “call waiting,” informs the customer that he or she has received another call. One problem with this feature, however, is that the customer first has to talk with the calling party without knowing whether or not the customer wishes to take the call.
Also, many telephone customers do not wish to miss all telephone calls when they are connected to an information network. To receive notification of calls, many customers subscribe to services provided by service providers that notify the subscriber of all calls that come in, usually by interjecting into the subscriber's computer screen a notification that a call has come in. One problem with these services is that, in some cases, they do not allow the subscriber to selectively determine beforehand whether or not the subscriber wants to be notified. Another problem with these services is that they do not allow a subscriber to determine, after being notified, how a call shall be handled other than to choose to be connected to the calling party. Still another problem with these services is that they do not allow a subscriber to give a calling party the power to disconnect the subscriber from an information session without the subscriber's post-call approval.
Also, subscribers to privacy screening services do not wish calling parties from whom subscribers wish to receive calls to be unnecessarily screened by such privacy screening services.
A privacy screening service is a service that allows a subscriber to the privacy screening service to screen incoming calls. The privacy screening service provides information to the called party (in this case, the subscriber to the privacy screening service) that allows the subscriber to make an informed decision as to whether or not to answer the call. For example, a subscriber may use the privacy screening service to block all private calls from going through. Private telephone numbers include telephone numbers that block services such as “calling party ID” that would otherwise identify the calling party to the called party. In telephone systems that offer private numbers and a privacy screening service to its customers, calls from a private number to a subscriber with the privacy screening service cannot be completed, unless the calling party authorizes the system to override the privacy of his number.
If the calling party's number is public, a communications network connects the call to the calling party, and typically also supplies the calling party's telephone number and sometimes the calling party's name.
If the number of the calling party is private, however, the prior art system asks the calling party to record his or her name before routing the call to the subscriber—a time consuming process. Routing the call to the subscriber generally requires a complex sequence of calls, queries and responses, thus burdening the network with additional traffic. Calling parties that call frequently, such as the subscriber's close friends or family members (or the subscriber himself or herself, calling home), who call from private numbers, would be unnecessarily screened each time they made calls to the subscriber. Such calling parties may find the unnecessary delays of having to listen to and respond to the privacy screening announcements very inconvenient.
Privacy screening systems are described in U.S. patent application Ser. Nos. 09/372,746 and 09/372,676 which are both incorporated herein by reference.